The scene where Lucas is in the hot spring with Ionia, the Magypsy. It cuts to black, and Ionia says things like "Don't struggle" and "Just endure it for a little bit", it can be interpreted the wrong way. Although given the game's darker and more mature themes, the symbolism of a fever awakening inside you might very well be intentional, something that Itoi heavily implies in an interview.
The near-constant references to "pulling [the Magypsies'] needles" in the third act can come off as innuendo to a sufficiently dirty mind.
Alternate Aesop Interpretation: The story doesn't hold back with its Humans Are Bastards and Gaia's Lament themes, what with the introduction of commerce and ownership causing the decline of Tazmily, but for some, it goes a bit deeper than that. The people of Tazmily are almost completely clueless how to cope with negative emotions such as loss or grief, are too stupid to see that they're being manipulated by the Pigmasks, and by accepting their takeover, are just as responsible for the collapse of their thrown-together society. They never bothered to learn from humanity's mistakes, merely forget them, and were easy targets for Porky's game. Seeing as the people who are able to fight back are those who understand grief (Lucas, Flint) or are charged with finding the truth (Duster, Wess, Kumatora), it's valid to see the game as a cautionary tale about ignorance, rather than a diatribe about how evil humans are.
Anti-Climax Boss: The Natural Killer Cyborg and Porky Minch, the last two bosses before the final one. While not exactly pushovers, they're considerably less challenging than the trio of bosses that precede them (the Barrier Trio, the Masked Man, and both forms of Fassad), and it's not unusual for players to beat them on the first try. They have tons of HP, but require relatively little strategy to beat; just make good use of healing, shields, and status debuffs, and you'll probably be fine.
Awesome Music: Even among all the great music in previous installments, it's truly a testament to the Shogo Sakai's skill that Mother 3 is widely agreed to have the best soundtrack of the trilogy, and on a Gameboy Advance, no less. Truly, it pushes the audio capabilities of the GBA to the limit as one of the very finest for that console. (It also helps that the soundtrack's sheer size and scope is absolutely ludicrous; it is, on the official OST, two hundred fifty tracks long. A number of these are variant tracks of battle themes or variations on leitmotifs, but even discounting those, the number of "unique" tracks in the game still goes into the three digits and covers all kinds of musical genres.)
The old man who randomly appears in the hot springs and says "Yes?" when spoken to.
The item boxes that open and play music, shoot fireworks into the air, or fart, but otherwise do absolutely nothing.
The part where the party accidentally drop their jar of pickles. Probably the only reason it exists is to give the player a single chance to play as Boney.
Breather Boss: The Oh-So-Snake in Chapter 2. Sure, it has a high Offense stat, a large amount of HP, and a really dangerous wave attack, but it leaves itself vulnerable for quite a while after performing that attack. Plus, Duster's Scary Mask can completely neuter it, and it's highly susceptible to PK Thunder.
The ending. As it was designed to be completely up to the interpretation of the player, conflicting opinions about it have inevitably popped up. Some were content with what the developers intended, while others were left unsatisfied with how it left a lot unexplained.
The Prolonged Prologue that is the first three chapters is also a point of contention. Some fans were put off by how long it takes, and how limited you are until you take control of Lucas again in Chapter 4, while others enjoy it for the world-building that takes place in it before the game truly starts.
Many players catch on to the foreshadowing regarding the fact that the Masked Man is Claus. Yet the final battle still impacts many players, regardless if they caught on to The Reveal. Same goes for Porky, especially if you've played EarthBound beforehand. To be fair, the creator mentioned he would be in the game way before it actually got published.
If you notice the music New Fassad and Miracle Fassad play on their horns (an ominous version of the Magypsy theme), the reveal of Fassad being Locria, the seventh Magypsy, might be a bit easier to figure out.
At the end of the game, someone tells Kumatora that she looks cute when she cries. Many people believe that Duster is the one saying this despite the game not giving any hints as to who it actually is.
An unused track is commonly believed to be Giygas's theme, which is supported by several unused backgrounds that look very much like Lucas and Claus in addition to some placeholder enemies, and both the backgrounds and enemies are believed to be an unused boss fight against Giygas. Word of God however claims that the final battle was always intended to be brother against brother, and that the final battle was originally going to be darker than in the final game. The "unused Giygas" theory turned out to be disproven, when a video was released showcasing an alternate version of the final battle, showing that the unused backgrounds were intended to be used for the final Masked Man fight. The unused music and its intended purpose however, remains a mystery to this day.
Contested Sequel: This game caused a Broken Base in Japan considering how much it strayed from the first two games. On 2ch and elsewhere, it is often said that They Changed It, Now It Sucks!. It is often assumed by international fans that the game is popular in Japan, but either its fans are a minority or its haters are a Vocal Minority.
Crosses the Line Twice: Meeting the Ultimate Chimera in a laboratory and facing a Non-Standard Game Over for simply touching the thing? Grade-A Nightmare Fuel. The Ultimate Chimera using the toilet in the Empire Porky Building? Many players probably formed a shit-eating grin at the sight.
Reconstructed Lions. They hit hard even when you encounter them later, have high speed which makes them likely to get at least one attack off before you can kill them, in addition to being incredibly quick in the overworld, making it nigh-impossible to avoid them, and have several attacks that hit the entire group for a decent amount of damage. They are unlikely to kill you when you encounter them later on, but this does notstop them from being majorly annoying.
Why yes, that men's bathroom sign just attacked you. And yes, it did just use PK Starstorm. It is exceptionally out of place, considering the only other two enemies to use that ability are a trio of guardians and a traitorous Magypsy, and it's just as exceptionally dangerous.
Porky Minch is this all over, along with his chimeras. Good lord, the fangirls. Some people make New Pork City look like a real utopia! Players may also say that Porky is a Love to Hate villain on the side.
Lil' Miss Marshmallow also fits this to a T. Had it not been for the existence of her Berserk Button over her Master's Friend's Yo-Yo (Ness' that is), she would have come across as a good-natured or at least sympathetic character! It also helps that a good number of fanfiction depicts her as a Type-II Anti Villain or even a Minion with an F in Evil thanks to her abusive master!
Due to many fans deciding to ship her with Lucas (in spite of the fact that she is pretty much never actually required to appear onscreen), Nana is much more prominent in fan works than most other Tazmilly villagers.
Many fans like Tessie due to her caring nature and how she's one of the nicest and most pleasant characters in the game even after the Pigmasks corrupt Tazmily.
On the antagonist side, a lot of people like the Ultimate Chimera.
Esoteric Happy Ending: The game ends with the corrupted world being destroyed by a benevolent Eldritch Abomination, and then cuts to total blackness. However, you can still walk around in it, and you soon discover that everyone made it out alive. You can talk to the other characters, who are apparently right there with you, and most of them seem relieved that they no longer have to live in that Crapsack World. However, given the fact that you're all in a black void, and the world was just destroyed, you all may very well be floating through space. Plus, nothing can change the fact that Lucas's Mother and Brother are dead. However, supplementary material published decades after the game's release reveals the cast, including Claus and Hinawa, survived in a new world.
Fair for Its Day: The Magypsies today have been criticized for embodying various negative stereotypes associated with gender-nonconforming people, on top of looking like mocking caricatures of Drag Queens that are often used to mock Transgender people. However, not only were they added in according to Itoi to give representation of his gender non-conforming friends at the time, but it's worth noting that the game still portrays the Magypsies as nice and likable characters who are allies to the heroes, have slightly distinct personalities, and are largely crucial to the plot. Also, while the game itself does describe the Magypsies as "strange, but well intentioned", which can come across as insensitive, none of the other characters ever really outright talk bad about the Magypsies.
Fandom-Enraging Misconception: Do not say that the Magypsies are the sole reason the game was never officially localized outside of Japan. While there are experienced analyzers that have come to this conclusion, Nintendo has never made an official statement confirming or deconfirming this. That they are firmly on the good side (with the exception of one) makes them some of the better (if flawed) depictions of queer characters in a Nintendo game.
Fandom Rivalry: Enjoys a mild one with EarthBound, mostly in terms of which one is the better game.
Just like Ness with his purple eyes, Lucas is almost always drawn with blue eyes in fanart. This is due to his appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl giving his Black Bead Eyes blue irises at the bottom. While Lucas's model in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U onward no longer includes this detail, fans still draw him with blue eyes.
On a similar vein, 90% of fanart where the Masked Man/Claus is unmasked, he will have mismatched eyes on the basis that Claus lost his left eye in the battle with the Mecha-Drago and when reconstructed as the Masked Man, it was replaced with an artificial red one. Some also think that he had lost his arm, given the presence of his Arm Cannon.
Claus and Fuel being best friends is a near-universally accepted headcanon, despite the two never interacting on screen. There is some basis to this though, as their fathers Flint and Lighter are best friends themselves.
While not as widely accepted as the idea that Giegue changed his name to Giygas when he transformed into an Eldritch Abomination, many English-speaking fans like to compromise the original and current English names for King P by having Pokey be his birth name, but changing his name to Porky to embrace his newfound role as the king of the Pigmasks.
This game is sometimes called EarthBound 2 or EarthBound 3. Following the first Mother game finally getting released as EarthBound Beginnings, some have taken to calling this one EarthBound Endings to follow the trend as well as emphasize the point that Itoi had made it clear he will not be making any more.
While officially just a mine underneath New Pork City, the final area of the game is often referred to as the "Cave of the Future" by fans as a reference to EarthBound's final dungeon.
Kumatora's PK Ground, which dishes out several hits of 2-13% of an enemy's HP and can cause them to trip and a lose a couple turns. This attack works on bosses. She doesn't learn it until level 60, but once she does, the rest of the game becomes pathetically easy. It should tell you everything when the Masked Man becomes an absolute joke after learning it.
There's a reason Salsa never returns to the party after his brief reappearance in Chapter 7: his Monkey Mimic ability becomes a little too effective the closer you get to the end.
Eggs, which you can buy from the start of Chapter 4 for only 40 DP, are this on two levels:
You can take them to the local Hot Spring and turn them into a Hot Spring Egg, which heals 100 HP and will never spoil. Repeat this enough, and you'll have more high-end healing items than you'll know what to do with.
You can keep them until they hatch into chicks and grow into chickens, then sell them for 200 DP (five times what an egg costs). Repeat this enough, and you can have more than enough money to last you through the entire game!
Black Beanling + Enemy Bufferizer. The Black Beanling is a Metal Slime and the enemy bufferizer increases EXP gain in exchange for making the enemy stronger. However, the Black Beanling still goes down rather quickly when used on him, and regardless of what level you're at, sometimes it's possible to get two or three level-ups in a single go using this tactic. This makes it incredibly easy to level up quickly.
Lucas' ultimate move, Refresh, gives the entire party a Healing Factor that heals for 10% maximum HP for five turns. This doesn't sound too overpowered until you take into account that HP goes down over time in this game, meaning that it has the potential to make everyone immortal if used properly.
The word Utopia originally was a pun partly derived from a Greek phrase meaning "no place". Also, the Trope Namer was on an island. In other words, a Nowhere Island.
Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Funnily enough, this game is far more universally praised internationally than in Japan. See the Contested Sequel entry above. Also, the international fanbase of the series in general is constantly growing with younger fans who weren't even alive when the first two games came out, in no small part due to Ness' and Lucas' inclusion in Super Smash Bros. games. By contrast, Japanese fans of the series aren't really united into a fanbase and mostly consists of people who remember the games from when they were originally released. International fans often assume that the series has a fanbase in Japan comparable in size and nature to theirs, but this is not the case.
The Cleocatras at the beginning of Chapter 7, especially when they attack in groups. They have an annoying tendency to use Lifeup both on themselves and each other to heal of any damage done to them at all, and they have the ability to cast Hypnosis.
Good Bad Bugs: While there are nearly no enemies where this can be used (only the Einswines in Chapter 7 allow this interaction without cheats or Debug Mode), Salsa's Monkey Mimic has a peculiar interaction with PK Thunder. Monkey Mimic will counter PK Thunder for every time he's targeted (but not necessarily hit), and he will counter for the total amount of damage he took. If you use Debug Mode to take him to a boss like Miracle Fassad, who has PK Thunder Omega, and it hits Salsa four times, he can retaliate for over 4000 damage.
While underwater, you must fill up on oxygen by kissing robot O2 tanks who look like middle-aged mermen wearing bright red lipstick. It makes Lucas, Kumatora, and Boney blush. Duster blushes too, but it's difficult to see due to his sprite's cheek marks being only a single pixel big. In the last level, there's a similar-looking centaur that offers oxygen above water for no reason.
One of the Pigmasks comments that he kind of likes them, disturbing his comrade.
There's something fishy about how exactly Ionia showed Lucas how to use PSI, though the Magypsies are neither male nor female.
There's also a Pigmask who nervously offers you an item when you're dressed as "the Commander" and insists it's just a friendly gift.
I Knew It!: Fans were able to guess the basic plot of this game years before it was released. On the one hand, this is impressive, as they had nothing but a few screenshots to work with, but on the other, they did have over five years to work it out.
While it is a major shock given the fact that it happens in the very first chapter of the game, Hinawa's death is something that people are pretty aware of nowdays.
King P is Porky Minch. It has long become common knowledge, especially after his appearance as a boss in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. It might even be lost on the player that the early game tries to mislead them into thinking that the aliens are back, what with the flying saucer and Pigmasks in their inhuman body-concealing uniforms.
Ditto with the Masked Man, pretty much everybody knows he's Claus.
LGBT Fanbase: Despite embodying certain stereotypes associated with trans/non-binary people, the Magypsys are fairly well-liked characters among the LGBT community. Much of this is owed to the fact that, with the sole exception of Locria (a.k.a. Fassad), the Magypsies are unwaveringly portrayed as on the side of good, providing valuable assistance to the heroes throughout the game and acting as surrogate parents for Kumatora.
Possibly deconstructed with Salsa. Yeah, he's almost totally useless and needs a lot of Level Grinding to stand up to the weakest of enemies without a Crutch Character, but he's so adorable and Fassad puts him through so much that you can't help but want to hug him. He's also only a temporary party member, so players can rush through Chapter 3 without much worry about grinding for the sake of long-term investment. Then, he manages to save Lucas and Boney from the Ultimate Chimera, so...
Boney is mostly superfluous, since his only actions are a mediocre basic attack and sniffing, a situational technique that doesn't even work on every enemy; if he didn't have better stats, Salsa would probably be stronger than him. Most players will end up using him simply for bashing the enemy and Item Caddy duty with Shield Killer, healing items, and bombs (since the only stat that matters for using items is speed, Boney's amazing speed stat lets him use items sooner in the round than any other character).
There are often questions regarding what Ionia did to Lucas in that hot spring, since the scene fades to black and she has dialogue like "Don't struggle!". Although, it is ultimately revealed that she was only making him hold his breath underwater.
FLINT/LUCAS/DUSTER LOVES CHEESE! / KUMATORA/BONEY/SALSA HATES CHEESE! Explanation The Peculiar Cheese food item restores 60 HP if the user loves cheese, but only 20 HP if the user hates cheese. Depending on what you named Lucas, he will either love cheese (if his name length is odd) or hate it (if his name length is even)
Welcome to the world of Mother 3!
Welcome to th :| Explanation During the development of the fan translation, one attempt to get the game to display "Welcome to the world of Mother 3!" was truncated, resulting in a meme among people following the translation's development.
a Ultimate Chimera appears!
The Ultimate Chimera itself is considered one. Heck, it even has its own GModgame mode. With Pigmasks!
The [character's name here]'s shield disappeared!
From the early days of the translation progress: The Flint equipped the Nut Bread!
Wess's door-opening dance, to the point where Starmen.net had a competition for it!
Flash forward to the E3 2014 digital event, and we have the gem of Reggie Fils-Aime roasting a fan complaining about this game's No Export for You with a Fire Flower.
Many people like to poke fun at NegativeMan's similar appearance to Spongebob. They'll even go as far as to reference the "soiled it" meme spawned by the latter.
[X] won't bringClausbackExplanation (Spoilers!) Claus' suicide is one of the saddest moments in the entire game, and one of the messages in the Miiverse stage of Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U that appeared when Lucas was fighting was "winning won't bring Claus back". The quote quickly became viral because of how much it Crosses the Line Twice and spawned further mutations that replaced "winning" with something else.
Captain Underpants + Mother 3 Explanation One shot in Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie shows Harold, a blonde kid in a striped shirt, running through a gold-colored field of flowers. The uncanny resemblance to Chapter 6 of Mother 3 was immediately picked up, leading to fans of both works jokingly comparing the two.
Moe: Lucas' initial shyness, adorable design, and woobieness earn him a lot of "d'awws" from players.
Most Wonderful Sound: Successfully hitting a 16-hit combo rewards the player with a very satisfying applause and cheer.
Despite being an otherwise emotionally effective game, at the very end when Claus mortally wounds himself to break from Porky's mind control. Despite being a shocking moment to both the players and attempting to evoke a psychological response, many couldn't help but laugh at what the game said:
As shown in this video, the final battle (or any other which is serious enough since it works on everything) can be ruined by using some of the sillier items, like the DCMC Boxers or Friend's Yo-Yo. For the latter, the Final Boss just can't help but applaud.
Nightmare Retardant: The Frightbots, in-universe to humans (they're among the weakest enemies in the game). They tell scary stories that aren't at all frightening. The sound they make, on the other hand, sure works on the Saturns.
In Chapter 1, in a series built around the protagonist usually having a close relationship with their mother during their adventure, it goes against the series expectations that Hinawa, Lucas's mother, is killed very violently.
You then play the first chapter as Hinawa's husband, Flint. Upon finding out about her death, he goes into a terrifyingHeroic BSoD, lashing out at other people in the village until he has to be knocked unconscious in order to be subdued. You then get the lovely experience of becoming Tazmily Jail's first prisoner.
Claus, Lucas's twin brother, then goes out into the mountains to try and avenge Hinawa. He fails.
As it turns out, the animal responsible for killing Hinawa was a Drago, a perfectly harmless creature Lucas used to be friends with. It's been "reconstructed" by a strange group of men wearing pig masks, making it aggressive and mindless.
In Chapter 2, you play as a thief named Duster. And, let's just say, his father is not very satisfied by his thieving abilities.
In Chapter 3, you play as a monkey named Salsa. He's getting routinely abused by a member of the Pigmask army named Fassad. He spends the chapter being forced to help them with their evil deeds, since his girlfriend is being held captive for leverage.
Then, at the end of the chapter, when the DCMC sing their goodbyes to "Lucky". It's for the greater good, but you'll feel really terrible for finally getting your last party member.
Chapter 6. Lucas chases Hinawa's ghost through a field of sunflowers, which are associated with her. It ends with you essentially making Lucas attempt suicide.
In Chapter 7, you find out about these Plot Coupons called the Seven Needles. Only Lucas and the commander of the Pigmask army, The Masked Man, are capable of pulling them. If Lucas pulls them, the world will be reborn anew and everything will be good and pure. If the Masked Man pulls them, the world will cease to exist.
And, in that chapter, you manage to only pull three. The enemy ends up getting the rest of them.
Hey, remember that Masked Man guy? The one who's been pulling all the other needles and striking you down at any given opportunity, hellbent on bringing the world to an end? It's Claus. Lucas's brother.
The final battle in the game is against the Masked Man. It may just be the most heartbreaking "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight ever executed. With your party knocked unconscious, leaving you alone, you cannot fight him. A battle implies a conflict on both sides, but Lucas can't bring himself to hurt his brother. All you can do is guard against his attacks, while a terrifying boss theme that rivals Giygas's in intensity assaults your ears. Forcing you to just try and survive blasts from your own iconic attack, slowly watch as your brother gets weaker until he can't even damage you anymore. And it ends with Claus using your always-dependable Franklin Badge that protects you to deliberately blast lightning so it will deflect back at him, with every intention of committing child suicide. All you can do is hear him apologize for his mistakes as he says goodbye... so he... he can be with his mother...
Sacred Cow: While it was always a Contested Sequel in its home country, for the first five years after the release of the Fan Translation, the game was widely considered by western audiences to be one of the greatest video games ever made, to the point where any attempt at criticizing it was harshly looked down upon. This eventually dissipated during The New '10s after EarthBound finally got its first official re-release outside of Japan via Virtual Console. The Newbie Boom brought about by this resulted in an influx of people unfamiliar with the Mother series' high regard, leading to them being more willing to scrutinize both this game and its predecessor.
Enemies calling for help. It's not uncommon to marathon 7 or 8 Reconstructed Moles in a single battle.
When either Lucas or Kumatora feels feverish, you cannot dash. It can range from annoying, when walking past an area with weak enemies, to frustrating if there are powerful enemies you are trying to avoid battling against or if you are leaving an area after a boss fight, and you are short on HP, PP, and recovery items.
Boney eating food items that are intended for another party member. Boney is the fastest of all party members and he is usually the first one to attack, so you may want to give most items to him. This doesn't happen very often but it feels like the game is giving you the middle finger when you have a party member in a critical condition, you try to use Boney to heal them with food, and Boney suddenly eats it. The frustration is doubled if it happens during a tough boss battle like the Jealous Bass.
Shocking Moments: In a series where the protagonist's mother is around the entire game, unaware players will be caught off guard by Hinawa's death very early into the game.
Slow-Paced Beginning: After the prologue introduces Lucas and his family, the first three chapters consist of switching between three different heroes, all with different abilities, and with a high level of restriction as to what items you can buy, what weapons you can equip, and where you can go. Many feel that the game only truly begins when the focus finally switches back to Lucas in Chapter 4, but it's a long time getting there.
Surprise Difficulty: EarthBound, for the most part, was Chrono Trigger-level easy, even without exploiting bugs. Mother 3, while still not a particularly hard game, does make sure pretty much every boss is quite challenging.
Suspiciously Similar Song: The Pig Army theme in general sounds like a demented version of Frere Jacques. Likely done intentionally.
Some of the battle songs are a pain in the ass to combo. Later enemies feature familiar battle themes that incorporate pauses of irregular length just to screw up your rhythm. So I heard you like songs in 29/16.
Porky coughed something up! This applies both an offense and defense debuff to your party, forcing you to spend a couple turns bringing them back up to speed.
Much like in its predecessor, any enemy capable of using PK Starstorm (the Barrier Trio, as well as Miracle Fassad and the Men's Room Sign of all things), when you don't see it coming, can mean very heavy damage to your party, if not outright a Total Party Kill.
The Masked Man used PK Love Gamma! (Even though the Masked Man has pulled 3 needles before your first fight against him, he doesn't use Omega, possibly to make things easier.) He only uses Omega in the final battle, where the strategy is to "defend, defend, defend, heal, repeat".
The Pig King Statue is quite possibly the very embodiment of this trope, with all of its attacks being capable of one-hit-killing your entire party. The fight is basically finding a way to kill it in one or two turns before it kills you, and there are only two ways to do this.
The Pork Tank, a nasty Wake-Up Call Boss fought when you have two characters under your control. One of them is Squishy Wizard Kumatora, while the other is the significantly weak Salsa. You also have Wess, who can contribute to battle with Thunder Bombs, but he isn't perfectly reliable. The Pork Tank has enough HP that it is perfectly possible to run out of PP and restoration items for Kumatora before the fight is over.
The Jealous Bass is a Flunky Boss that can perform a combo attack that could ruin your party. Said party, at the time you face him, only consists of Lucas and Boney. Your immediate thought is to defeat his flunkies to disable the combo attack, but that also makes him go berserk.
Mr. Genetor has a ton of HP, deals Collision Damage when hit with a physical attack, and has a Discharge Zap attack that deals massive thunder damage to the whole party. Unless you bought lightning-resistant rubber coats from the vending machine in King P's playroom, you'll be in for a world of hurt against him.
New/Miracle Fassad, for being fond of status effects and being able to heal 500+ HP seemingly at random. Then Miracle Fassad goes One-Winged Angel and uses high-level PSI attacks...
The Barrier Trio, a Barrier Change Boss that has a strong physical defense stat and is immune to all but one element of offensive PSI once their Barrier Poses go up. They possess several strong PSI attacks of their own, up to PK Starstorm (which they can only use once, every other time will fail). Their battle theme also has a nonstandard rhythm.
The Steel Mechorilla, who punishes you for excessively exploiting its weakness to electric attacks by short-circuiting and tearing through your party.
The Masked Man. He hits incredibly hard with both physical and PSI attacks (including the aforementioned PK Love), uses two attacks per turn, has a ton of HP, and a battle theme like the Barrier Trio's, but with a little skip just to mess with your rhythm. And don't even try of using shields against him - he'll instantly dispel them with the Shield Killer, before hitting you with a PK Love Gamma to rub it in - very hard-hitting but manageable if Lucas has PSI Lifeup Omega, but can easily spell defeat if he doesn't.
The Natural Killer Cyborg, who is huge, extremely tough, and packs a wide variety of devastating physical attacks.
Porky, who hits hard with inexplicable attacks, can put up PSI Counters to reflect your magic damage, and has an attack that hits your entire party for massive attack and defense debuffs.
Chapter 3. While all of the first three chapters are difficult, Chapter 3 is this by far. For starters, you spend the entirety of it as a Joke Character who is easily KO'd, you have to do a lot of menial and repetitive tasks that get old quickly, and the entire time you're forced around by a Jerkass who makes the character's life a living hell even when he performs the tasks he asks flawlessly. To top it off, at the end of the chapter, you fight what many consider to be one of the hardest bosses in the game, not helped by the fact that you only have said Joke Character and a Squishy Wizard in the party, with a Guest-Star Party Member who more often than not does nothing for his turn. While this chapter does have a point story-wise note showing how evil the bad guys are and the slow corruption of Tazmily, the hell it puts the player through and the general hopeless air it has makes some wonder why the chapter's even in the game, and a few to hate the protagonist of said chapter because of how useless he is when it comes to said chapter's harder parts.
The end of Chapter 4 also takes a nasty Difficulty Spike. Lucas and Boney are still on their own when Violet/Kumatora sends them to the attic of Club Titiboo to avoid detection. Not only is it an absolute labyrinth with many dead ends, but it's full of enemies that are more than willing to get the jump on you. The end boss of the area (and of the chapter) is Jealous Bass, who is infamous for many a game over, as stated under That One Boss.
The Sea Floor Dungeon segment in Chapter 7. Though the enemies aren't too difficult to deal with, the area not only is long and easy to get lost in but also very tedious due to the fact that the player characters move slower while underwater. In addition to having an Oxygen Meter that depletes fairly quickly, meaning you have very little time to actually explore each area.
That One Sidequest: Completing the Battle Memory with all available front and back sprites is the only major side task of the game, and it's a doozy for many reasons:
The easiest way to see an enemy's back sprite is to turn them around with Duster's Siren Beetle... but you don't have access to that combo for half of the game (Duster isn't playable in Chapters 3, 4, and part of 7, and doesn't have the Siren Beetle in Chapter 1). For everything else, you need to rely on back-attacks, Made-You-Looks (only purchasable in Chapter 4 onwards), or the random chance for Salsa's dance to turn enemies around.
Many enemies are only seen a few times throughout the game, vanishing randomly after certain chapters or story events, or are only found in areas you can get locked out of.
You can't turn around enemies during scripted battles, so for some bosses, you need to wait for them to reveal their alternate sprite through one of their attacks. There are also two Pigmask enemies that aren't fought outside of scripted battles until Chapter 8, so their back sprites can only be gotten at the end of the game.
The Zombieshroom on Tanetane Island needs to be fought and lost to before the party enters their Mushroom Samba, as it can't be logged by fighting its Eerie Smile version.
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: Among Japanese audiences, the game is widely criticized for its shift from general "urban" environments to a more rural fantasy setting, as the former was what gave the Mother series its charm and what made it stand out from other RPGs in the first place. This also pops up among some Western fans too, but nowhere near as much.
Believe it to not, there are many fans who believe Hinawa should've lived throughout the entire game or a least a larger part of it instead of getting killed off early.
Quite a few people are rather disappointed that the Ultimate Chimera remains The Unfought throughout the game and is only a One-Hit Kill hazard you have to avoid. Many think it would have made for an interesting and challenging superboss.
A large amount of the story from Chapter 4 onwards involves Lucas in some fashion. Unfortunately, due to him assuming the role of a Silent Protagonist after the Time Skip, we're only able to make educated guesses about his side of things. The last two chapters are especially jarring; from Lucas' role in destiny for awakening the Dragon, to him quite clearly having the worst of the Mushroom Samba, and ultimately his thoughts on learning Claus was the Masked Man... we don't see his thoughts on any of it. To see Lucas' character woven much tighter into the game's events than previous MOTHER protagonists but still not have it followed through on... it's a little disappointing. This is mitigated a bit in the final battle, where with Lucas outright refusing to attack and battle text such as "Lucas wanted to cry.", we're definitely getting some input from Lucas' side.
The reveal that Fassad is the seventh Magypsy is built up well throughout the game and happens to be one of the lesser-known twists of the game. However, by the time it's revealed, every Magypsy besides Fassad/Locria is dead, and Fassad is rotting away in the sewers after his final battle. The game never gets to elaborate on how Fassad felt towards the other Magypsies or how he met Porky and defected to his side.
The trio of primary antagonists behind the Pigmask Army—Porky Minch, Fassad, and Claus—have interestingly contrasting personalities and visual designs, not to mention very different backstories. It's a shame that we never get to see the three of them interact with each other, and we never get a real sense of how they function together as a group.
The Un-Twist: Notable in that many of these were predicted before the game even came out and all the fanbase had to go on was a few screenshots and broad-stroke descriptions:
The Masked Man is actually Claus.
King P. is actually Porky.
Vindicated by History: The game's initial Contested Sequel reputation in Japan has slowly improved with the passage of time, being better-regarded now compared to the few years around the game's release. Much of the criticism at the time boiled down to how different it was from the previous two gamesnote in Japan, the series was universally beloved since the 80s and so every minor betrayal of people's expectations drew a disproportionately immense amount of criticism, as well as pent-up frustration from the game's infamous Development Hell. As time goes on, however, the Japanese fandom is becoming more and more accepting of Mother 3 as being a great game despite being different from its predecessors, although Mother 2 is still generally the most well-regarded entry.
What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: Don't let the colorful sprites/background and witty humor trick you, Mother 3 is a really dark world you're entering. The game starts out bright and cute, but after Hinawa's death, everything goes downhill from there, to the point it becomes one of the most tragic Role Playing Games of all time by the end. Aside from the tragedy and intense drama, the amount of profanity will stagger as the game goes on, and there will be references to alcohol and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Not to mention animal/child abuse being a small plot point.
Lucas, the main hero, is the biggest one the game has. At first, Lucas lives a happy life with his family, but all that changes when one of the previously friendly Dragos, controlled by Pokey Minch's army, murders his mother, Hinawa. Then after the news is broken to his doting father, Flint, he breaks down in grief-filled rage and nearly strikes his own sons with a stick. With both his mother and father out of commission or left the village of Tazmily, his brother, Claus, goes to investigate, but is kidnapped and brainwashed by the Pigmasks. Lucas goes on a seemingly hopeless journey to reunite with his brother and father. Through this, he witnesses many deaths at the hands of the Pigmasks. By the end, he has to kill his own brother, who was the Masked Man. Lucas can't bring himself to do it, and so Claus ends his own life to spare both of them when Pokey's control proved too much to handle. Throughout the journey, he constantly breaks down in tears and just wants his family back as he is an emotionally crippled pre-teen.
Poor little Salsa. First, his girlfriend gets kidnapped by the Pigmasks, and they threaten to kill her if he doesn't go along with their plan. Then, he gets stuck with Fassad, an unrepentant Jerkass who insults, starves, and shocks him at every opportunity, even when Salsa does what Fassad told him to, all throughout Chapter 3. Thankfully, Salsa eventually takes a level in badass, while nearly all of Fassad's future appearances end with him getting maimed.
The Negative Man enemy. It's just absolutely pathetic, rattling off nihilistic quotes, and it barely makes an effort to attack you. It truly makes you feel sorry beating it up in its little cave.
Kumatora's waitress alter-ego gets named Violet instead of Yoshikoshi, and Duster's name when he's with the DCMC isLucky instead of Tamekichi. Their aliases were changed because their Japanese names were too long to enter into the naming screens in English.
Averted in the case of Hinawa's name. Tomato almost gave her the name "Amber," which would have fit very well considering she's married to Flint (in Japanese, their names reference "Hinawa-juu" and "Furinto-juu," meaning matchlock and flint guns) but decided to leave that one alone due to Super Smash Bros. Brawl's use of the name. Similarly, other names like Kumatora are kept, avoiding this trope as well.
The mice in Club Titiboo's attic spoke in an incredibly difficult-to-understand dialect of Japanese in the original game. In the fan translation, it was changed to a similarly-impenetrable Cockney accent.
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